Emptying: the world is changing

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06/28/2011 5:30pm

Location: UP Football field across Commonwealth Avenue

I've Thrown Away My Citalopram

Constants

Great loves die with our youth, but today the simplicity of love is alive.

-- Alula dela Cruz

Probable Futures

1. Finish my master's degree in 3 years

2. Have my own car and actually drive it

3. Go to Vietnam

4. Go to Cambodia

5. Go to India

The Plan
Date: June 30, 2016
Time: 10:00am
Where: Lodhi Garden, New Delhi, India
What: We'll see about that.

6. Go to Europe

I cannot possibly forget this now that I've written it down (unless I delete this entry).  It need not follow this order, I just have to remember the rest of the details for number 5. From now on, I'll be busy trying to get to do these things in 5 years. It will be weird reading this post again by then. I will be a lot older. I hope I don't disappoint myself when all that time has passed.

****

I want to be where I've never been before
I want to be there and then I'd understand
Know I'm right and do it right, could I get to be like that?
I'll know what I don't know, with nothing more to gain
Will I get better or stay the same?
I find I always move too slowly

And all the people who've seen it all before
And all the people who really understand
Know they're right, and have done it right,
Could I get to be like that?

I'll know what I don't know, it's harder everyday
Can't lift a finger, can't hurt a fly
I've found I always move too slowly
One thing's for certain, I'm insecure

I never knew till someone told me that
If that's all you will be, you'll be a waste of time
You've dreamed a thousand dreams, 
None seem to stick in your mind
Two points for honesty, it must make you 
Sad to know that nobody cares at all. 
They never care at all.

-- Guster, "Two Points for Honesty"

As if we haven't deluded ourselves enough

Since that faithful day in college history class, I never really knew how to treat June 12 as a legitimate Philippine independence day. I'm no historian, I was just a history student for at least 3 semesters in college, 4 years in high school, and 7 years in grade school. And no, I don't think I know much about the meaning of freedom either.

We Filipinos need to know more about our past. It's a sad fact a lot of events that concern the welfare of our nation and why we are in this state are not written on text books. I recommend this informative piece (please click on the link). If you want to educate yourself a little bit more about your roots, I'm sure you will take the time.

Hold Still

"Vanity, my favorite sin."
-- Al Pacino, The Devil's Advocate

self-portrait

My relationship with glass and mirrors

and the things our eyes aren't meant to see clearly

Counting

Numbers are useless, yet many have counted
the numerous ways people say their goodbyes.

How many of it we've seen: a slow hand waving
where before that was an embrace, a slow release,

a peck on the cheek, or simply, a pat on the back.
Certainly, more useless counting follows during the wait

for their return. Perhaps this was how patience was
discovered: when a man long yearned for a friend to arrive.

Once, I crossed a road on a summer’s night. The numbers
went about meaningless, and yet to count the stars

knowing the great distance of home, to gather
understanding of the plight back, made perfect sense.

Over the Gate 
February 2011

Crossing

I emptied my pockets to surrender
all sharp and flammable belongings
before admitting to have this fear
of flying: more particularly, of the fall.

Never mind the pain from the fiery disaster
that might become of my trip. I've fallen
in dreams during restless sleep, and in them
I relied heavily on force fields which knew
of frailty and when to stop such madness.

But my baggage is checked in. Like so many
passengers waiting, we took turns glancing
at planes landing and taking off. We were
figuring out which emerging heads arrived
home, or have come only as visitors.

Then perhaps, I will doze my flight away
knowing too well that I will dread waking
from the same frightful sleep. To find it
chance upon me-- when there is no more
means to fall, need for nets. Just another side.



Written 02/14/2010
Revised 6/6/2011

It's a Draw

"Insist on nothing else but a new start.
Admire the danger of it"

-- Jacob Walse-Dominguez, in the absence of proof

This Side
April 2011

Persistence of Memory

Time Goes Away


He took me to the hillside
He liked to take me there
He took me every Saturday
He put flowers in my hair

And we laughed like my mother said she once did
With my father on his birthday
When they went swimming
And he took her hand into his
And he told her that he loved her
His words held meaning

How do we make these moments last?
How do we get them to stay?
When everything passes and time goes away

He took me to the theater
He liked to take me there
He took me every Sunday
We did our talking there

And we laughed like my mother said she once did
With her sister on her birthday when she was seventeen
They took her car out for a spin
Along the ocean with the top down
And life held meaning

How do we make these moments last?
How do we get them to stay?
When everything passes and time goes away

-- Rosie Thomas

Anxiety

It's difficult to disclose personal information when:

1. your friends are busy

2. your friends are far away

3. they can't catch up so they can't understand

4. you just want to be alone all the time, you don't want to be anywhere else

5. you buried a body in the basement (yup, you definitely have a problem)

I wonder if these are the reasons why people seek psychiatric help and turn to anti-depressants and other "calming" drugs to make them feel better. Lack of friends? Or, lack of trust? I think everyone has some form of psychological disorder, we develop defense mechanisms and just learn to cope with it over time. Some become assholes, others become hypocrites. Some try really hard to do the right things and are still misunderstood. Well, it just sounds like every day life to me.

"I don't want to be here."

I guess the percentage who fail to handle their own minds either admit that they need help or are forced by their family/friends to get professional help. Which brings me to my next question: 

What happens when they don't get help?